Desired By The Pack: Part Three (6 page)

January hovered beside the unconscious hunter, weighing the consequences of her actions. The man’s chest rose and fell with slow, shallow breaths. If she wasn’t staring at him, she might have mistaken him for a corpse.

The trailer was silent around her, only three people in the Peace River Guardians’ makeshift infirmary. She stroked her thumb around the plastic casing of the syringe she held in her hand. Her heart pounded so loudly, she doubted she would be able to hear Cleo return.

Prince waited in the next room. Waited for January to save him from the treacherous ropes he’d wrapped around his own neck when he decided to engage hunters.

When he’d decided to defy the Moon by pumping his body full of hunters’ drugs.

Pain pinched in her chest when her heart cracked, the same as it bit into the palm of her hand as she squeezed the syringe’s hard edges. She dragged a ragged breath into her aching lungs and closed her eyes.

“Can’t do it, can you?” The low question came from the doorway behind her.

Adrenaline spiked through January’s veins. Her eyes flew open and she whirled to face Cleo. No point even trying to hide her guilt.

Cleo turned on the lamp just inside the door and came into the room. She had changed clothes in the short time she was gone. The bright hair at her temples was damp.

January catalogued the meaningless details, unsure what to say.

“The thing about being a healer is it’s all you know how to do. Fix, not break.” Cleo deposited a cloth bag on the exam table. “I brought you something to eat, but by the look of you, you don’t have the stomach for food.”

Fingers trembling, January placed the syringe beside the bag. Cleo picked it up.

“It’s empty,” she said.

“No. It’s full of air.”

Cleo raised an eyebrow but didn’t say anything. She dismantled the syringe and disposed of it in a designated receptacle, then she gestured to the door. “Let’s go find Beck.”

“That’s probably best,” January
said, voice faint.

As she preceded Cleo from the trailer, she cast a sad glance at the closed door to Prince’s room.

Friend or pack, that was her dilemma. And her heart had chosen pack. Leaving that trailer felt like walking away from a life she could never get back.

Beck found January and Cleo before they found him. He exploded from the tree line, radiating fierce energy, his jaw set in a purposeful square.

Pointing at January, he bit out, “Empty every trailer. I need everyone right here, right now.”

He took Cleo’s arm and steered her around, back to the infirmary. “Wake that hunter.”

Beck charged through the infirmary’s flimsy door. The fragile barrier popped a hinge, injecting a fresh surge of adrenaline into his blood. Their encampment wasn’t designed to withstand an attack of any scale.

“What’s happening?” Cleo followed close behind him as he stalked into the room holding the wounded hunter.

“Smoke found tracks. Eighteen different sets, coming in from different directions. Wake him up.” He ripped the eye patches from the hunter’s slack face and dug the ear plugs from his ears. Deaf and blind didn’t matter anymore. The man wouldn’t live long enough to carry any tales out of the camp.

While Cleo prepared a syringe, Beck spun and went after Prince. He found Prince prying at the narrow window, trying to get out.

“You.” Beck grabbed the other man by the back of his neck and flung him to the narrow cot. “Tell me everything.”

“Where’s January?” Prince’s gaze darted around the cramped room, his posture defiant.

Beck growled, “Tell me.”

Prince flinched but words didn’t immediately fall from his mouth. Nothing about Prince’s manner spoke of a submissive wolf confronted by a dominant wolf. Something was very damn wrong.

Beck bared his teeth, allowing the beginnings of his change to show.

Prince held up his hands. “Drugs, like I told Jan.
It’s pills. They call the drug Mutatio. Transformation. I didn’t do anything wrong. The wolf is mine. I did what I had to do to make it work!”

He shouted the last few words in a guttural, garbled voice. Before Prince could complete the change into something Beck didn’t know how to control, Beck lashed out with his fist. He slammed Prince into the wall. The trailer rocked with the impact.

Prince shook it off and shoved to his feet. He crouched on the cot, fur sprouting from his skin in great, shaggy tufts.

His face grew into something monstrous and misshapen, unlike any battle-earned or birth-given deformity Beck had ever seen. But that wasn’t right. Beck had seen this before on a cell phone’s tiny display.

Aware of Cleo on the other side of another thin wall, he calculated his options and came up with fuck-all. Prince was still changing, filling the narrow space with his growing bulk. Claws as long as Beck’s hands sprang from Prince’s fingertips.

Prince’s head, as broad as Beck’s chest, smacked into the ceiling. The flimsy panels crumbled, raining gray dust in Beck’s eyes.

And then Prince howled. The sound, neither human or wolven, turned Beck’s blood to ice.

“Cleo, get out.” He felt her behind him, fear and shock an acrid odor.

“Goddess,” She breathed.

Prince shook the debris from his head. His spine bent as he doubled over, trying to make room for his unnatural body. His glittering black gaze slid past Beck’s shoulder and fixed on Cleo.

The word Prince snarled had no recognizable shape but the massive, lengthening rope of flesh between his furred legs did.

“Cleo.” Beck growled her name, not taking his eyes off Prince.

“The hunter’s dead.”

“Go.”

She bolted, buckling under the dominant force of his shout.

Beck retreated into the hall in order to buy himself room. As he touched his fingers to the floor, his body changed swiftly, an easy transition aided by the Moon.
Nothing like Prince’s slow, chaotic mutation. At the fringes of his awareness, he felt the psychic noise of his pack, growling confusion, all of them too occupied with tracking the hunters and securing the Moon gate to come to his aid.

Feminine voices and a new infant’s hoarse, squawking cry brought Prince’s head around, pulling his focus from Beck. As Prince crammed his muzzle against the miniscule window, Beck struck.

He launched from his crouch, the strength of his hind quarters giving height to his leap and speed to his claws. As he collided with the muscular expanse of Prince’s back, he tore into the flesh.

Enraged, Prince spun and rammed his back into the wall. The trailer’s seams gave with a shriek and a groan. Beck held his position as he and Prince plunged through the opening that hadn’t existed a moment earlier.

Beck felt his bones crack as Prince landed on top of him. Prince flipped to all fours and darkness swam behind Beck’s eyes. The world became scent, sound and instinct.

January’s scent.

The infant’s weak scream.

An instinct to protect his mate and the helpless young at any cost.

He’d taken his wolf’s shape for speed, agility and the natural weapons of tooth and claw. Employing everything he had, he scrambled over Prince’s shoulder and sank his fangs into the neck of the monstrous form.

Blood spurted across his tongue, bitter and hot. It tasted like poison but Beck locked his jaws and tore deeper into the jugular vein.

Prince released another of the alien roars and fire raked through Beck’s limbs. The trees and ground spun as Prince thrashed.

Beck felt the world pitch sideways. His body wouldn’t withstand another crushing fall so he whipped his head back and shoved off Prince’s shoulders.

Flesh tore, caught in Beck’s jaws. He hit the ground and rolled to his feet before he spat the bloody meat onto the mud.

The space between rows of trailers wasn’t large. Prince staggered and careened into the fragile structure opposite the infirmary. The trailer’s cinder blocks held but the siding tore under Prince’s bloodied claws.

As Prince reeled back, Beck saw January and Cleo on his other side. January clutched a swaddled bundle to her chest while Cleo crouched in front of her, a protective barrier between January, the baby, and violence.

Gunshots split the
night, a volley that echoed off the mountains well after the last shot was fired.

Beck was out of time.

Bounding over Prince’s hunched and writhing form, he growled at Cleo and shouldered into January’s legs, urging the women to move.

“What does he want?” January’s voice sounded raw and wretched.

“Us to move. Come on. The route to the fall is still clear.” Cleo stood.

Beck tossed his head and trotted ahead of them, scenting the wind as they fled through the trees.

Behind them, Prince still breathed his guttural cries. The infant cried, too, but Prince was making more noise.

As they neared the river, Beck reclaimed his human form. He helped January as close to the water as he dared, since she carried her fragile burden.

“Where is Mira?” He steadied her with a hand on her back.

“I don’t know. The baby was alone when I got to her trailer. I didn’t get to any of the others before…”

Beck nodded. He could feel her shock. It mingled with confusion and grief.

Harsh emotions, and he’d thrust them upon her. She didn’t look at him as they hurried along the river, physically side by side but emotionally slipping away.

Several more shots echoed before they reached the waterfall that hid the Moon gate. Beck didn’t see any of the Guardians along the way. He didn’t see any signs of human hunters, either, and that was the real important thing.

The Moon gate was undisturbed, January was safe, and the infant she carried still lived.

He didn’t know if he’d managed to kill Prince, but he would tear the other man’s throat out time and again to protect her.

January protected the tiny baby as best she could, but the waterfall was deafening and remaining dry was impossible. By the time she emerged into the cold cavern behind the fall, the baby was wailing and shaking. She and the newborn were both soaked to the skin.

Cleo took January’s arm and guided her deeper into the cave, her footing as sure as January’s was clumsy. January couldn’t see a thing for several minutes. The roaring fall and hysterical baby’s stiff, shaking body dominated her senses.

Just as the darkness brought her to the brink of joining the baby in tears, it gave way to a faint silver light. The noise lessened as well, but not enough for conversation.

Signing her intent, Cleo pointed to a pile of thick blankets and animal pelts folded against one of the walls, which were dry this deep into the mountain. She plucked at January’s shirt and the sodden blanket wrapped around the baby.

Taking her meaning, January quickly stripped herself and the child and settled on a softly-furred hide. Cleo arranged two blankets around her shoulders, effectively swaddling her and the infant together to share body heat.

Soon, the baby stopped shaking and
slept, her tiny mouth working rhythmically against January’s skin.

Cleo crossed to another wall and started dragging long panels of wood from a natural ledge. She used some of the panels to cover about three quarters of the pool. As she did, the light dimmed.

After draping what looked like a black tarp over the boards covering the pool, Cleo settled beside her. She drew the blankets back enough to check on the sleeping baby, gave January a thumbs-up sign, and sat back, unblinking gaze focused on the narrow opening that served as a door to their small grotto.

Time slipped by. January watched the entrance for a while but eventually shifted her gaze to the sliver of water still visible. With a start, she realized what it was.

A Moon gate.

The Moon gate, which anchored these wolves to the Peace River Falls.

She gave Cleo a nervous glance but the other woman wasn’t looking at her. She was rising to a crouch, her fingertips touching the stone floor. Movement in the shadows of the entrance drew January’s gaze and Cleo stood as two wolves staggered into view.